| A Matter of WHO | |
| Director: | Don Chaffey |
| Producer: | Milton Holmes Walter Shenson |
| Starring: | Terry-Thomas Sonja Ziemann Alex Nicol Richard Briers |
| Music: | Edwin Astley |
| Cinematography: | Erwin Hillier |
| Editing: | Frank Clarke |
| Studio: | Foray Productions |
| Distributor: | Metro Goldwyn Mayer |
| Runtime: | 90 minutes |
| Country: | United Kingdom |
| Language: | English |
A Matter of WHO is a 1961 British comedy thriller film directed by Don Chaffey and starring Terry-Thomas, Julie Alexander, Sonja Ziemann, Alex Nicol, Richard Briers, Honor Blackman and Carol White.[1] [2]
A World Health Organization employee tries to trace the source of a deadly virus.
Aboard an airliner flying from Nice to London, an oil driller returning from the Middle East named Cooper becomes very ill. This attracts the notice of World Health Organization self-styled "germ detective" Archibald Bannister. It turns out that Cooper's new wife, Michèle, and his business associate, Kennedy, know each other.
Bannister is reprimanded by his boss, Hatfield, for previously shutting down London Airport because of what turns out to be an ordinary rat. This time, however, Cooper is diagnosed with highly infectious smallpox. There are also outbreaks in Brussels and Zurich. Bannister suspects that all three cases were contracted from a fourth person, a carrier.
It was made at MGM-British Elstree Studios with sets designed by Elliot Scott. MGM records say it lost $142,000.[3]
The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "This latest attempt to emulate Hitchcock never finds a balance between Terry-Thomas's brand of civil service comedy and the surrounding atmosphere of suspicion and peripatetic detection. The mood aimed at is closest to Hitchcock's Secret Agent [''1936]; the actual measure of achievement falls far short. The germ-laden needle in a haystack which the two amateur detectives are seeking should have a magnetic attraction for the audience. As it is, a confused script and Don Chaffey's flat direction combine to produce a jaded impression of a number of TV's Interpol episodes running one into another; and Terry-Thomas's none too humorous skirmishing round the haystack ends up forcing from it nothing more deadly than a field-mouse."[4]
Leslie Halliwell said: "Curious blend of semi-documentary with suspense and comedy; not really a starter."[5]